In the field of commercial art, there is a significant need for the simple means of transferring prefabricated letters or characters to a "paste-up" sheet for later photographing and printing. A dry rub-on transfer letter process is well known. However, these materials are supplied in sheets and must be carefully aligned to produce acceptable images. Machines were later developed which prepared such letters on a continuous tape which solved many of the alignment problems. An example of such machine is shown in PCT Publication WO82/03600 and in U.S. Pat. No. 3,912,064, as well as U.S. Pat. No. 4,243,333.
Since the transfer of characters may be used in enlargement and high resolution printing, the imprint must be extremely accurate. As the transfer media is often a carbon film impressed onto a paper tape having low adhesion, high force must be applied to make a proper impression and a striking position of the hammer and anvil in the printing mechanism must be extremely well aligned. In addition, all of this activity must take place in a very short time period if the machine is to be capable of high speed printing.
The present invention overcomes the problems noted above inherent in the prior art while providing a mechanism capable of rapid generation of characters with an extremely high degree of quality and consistency.